A 56-year-old woman, treated with tocilizumab (TCZ) for 8 months for severe rheumatoid arthritis (RA), was admitted to the hospital due to the swelling and tenderness of parotid glands. The patient was diagnosed with seropositive erosive RA in 1988, and treated with different disease modifying antirheumatic drugs (DMARDs) that were used together with a low dosage of glucocorticoides, followed by biologic therapy with infliximab and adalimumab which also proved to be inefficient. The patient had an excellent initial response on TCZ therapy. After 8 months, she was presented with an extreme enlargement of parotid glands. Bacterial, viral, and granulomatous diseases were excluded. A spectrum of autoantibodies including anti-Ro and anti-La showed normal values, expect for slightly elevated anti-cyclic citrullinated peptide (anti-CCP) and extreme elevation of the rheumatoid factor (RF) to 10,100 IU/ml. The biopsy of salivary glands was done and histological specimen showed limphoplasmocytic syaloadenitis. Tocilizumab therapy was stopped and the dosage of glucocorticoids and methotrexate (MTX) was raised. After 6 weeks, the patient was in better condition with slightly lower levels of RF (9,010 IU/ml). We hypothesise that in this patient, TCZ stimulated RF hyper production which can induce a paradoxical secondary syaloadenitis in RA.
Stiff Person Syndrome (SPS) is a rare autoimmune neurological disorder characterized by progressive stiffness and rigidity of truncal muscles accompanied with co-contraction of agonist-antagonist muscles. Our 51-year-old female patient was presented for the first time to physiatrists in 2006 and diagnosed with axial-spondyloarthropathy (SpA) HLA-B27 positive. SPS was diagnosed 7 years after initial symptoms. SPS should be taken into consideration in HLA-B27 positive patients if stiffness of paravertebral and abdominal muscles progresses during SpA therapy.
Background: Identifying high-risk patients for transfusion after cardiac operations would alter postoperative management. The aim of this study was to investigate closure time (CT) measured by platelet function analyzer (PFA) for prediction of bleeding and transfusions. Methods: 66 patients were scheduled for coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) surgery and 30 patients for valve repair and replacement (non-CABG). Measurements of PFA-100® CT for collagen and adenosine diphosphate (cADP) and collagen and epinephrine (cEPI) were performed 15 min after protamine administration. Blood loss was measured, and the amount of transfusion products was recorded postoperatively. Results: The study demonstrated significant differences between CABG patients with cADP-CT ≥ 118 s and those with cADP-CT < 118 s with regard to blood loss for 24 h (p = 0.001) and blood loss for 25-48 h (p = 0.003) as well as fresh frozen plasma (p = 0.015), platelet (p > 0.001) and red blood cell (p = 0.002) units given in 48 postoperative h. There were no differences cardiopulmonary bypass when was applied. In non-CABG patients, there were no differences in blood loss and transfusion requirements with respect to cADP-CT and cEPI-CT. Conclusion: Postoperative platelet dysfunction measured by a prolonged cADP-CT was significant predictor of blood loss and transfusion in CABG patients.
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